The National Service Scheme (NSS) in Ghana is a one year mandatory post-tertiary service to the government. You do not get paid, there's only an allowance (less than $150 a month) to keep you going. Why? The government (actually, our taxes) subsidizes the cost of tertiary education; we only pay academic facility user fees.
In my opinion, the NSS could be a goldmine for the country; an opportunity to get quality work done, by degree holders, for almost no pay. Now, if I were the NSS Director:
- I would ask applicants to attach their resumés to their NSS application: So I can better assess their strengths and weaknesses and place them at strategic postings to our (applicant and government) mutual benefit.
- I would categorize applicants into:
- Those who held leadership positions whilst in college
- Those who took active part in extra-curricular activities and held positions of responsibility
- Those who developed skill sets outside their course requirements
- The rest; regardless of their GPA
- I would place those in Category 1, who are usually those with political affiliations (SRC Prez, etc) in the classrooms, so that when (not if) they become politicians, they would value education at all levels
- I would put together the list of research, 'reports', and those committee-and-review-and-probe stuff our government likes to do, as well as on-going and new projects that need to be supervised or undertaken by professionals. I would place the Category 2 and 3 applicants in these roles. They would head or supervise the less complicated ones, and we'll have them constituting committees headed by consultants for the rest. At least with that we can cut down the huge costs of sitting allowances and 'coffee breaks'. The government would also benefit from the skill sets of our Category 3 applicants; websites, improving infrastructure, etc. ALL FOR LESS THAN $150/MONTH PER PERSON. Isn't that cool!
- To those in Category 2 and 3, I'll also give the option of starting their own businesses, with the allowance giving them a steady income for a year. Of course, we'll have some sort of business incubation section of the NSS to give guidance and make sure they do not fail.
You notice I didn't say anything about the Category 4 applicants. I do not know what to do with them. Maybe the big GPAs should go to the classrooms? What do you think? If you were the NSS Director ...
if i were the NSS Director...i will creat 4 catergories, Education/Social, Health, Technical and Agriculture.all those who did health related courses(including pharmacy,biochem,nusring) will be posted to health institutions,those who did technical courses(engineering,computer science,law,business) will be posted to public/private companies such as VRA,Gridco,Guiness,toyota,law firms,banks,etc).all agric related courses(land economy,civil eng,BT) will be posted to construction companies,land commision,plantations,csir,etc.lastly, the rest (social science,languages,psycology,music and dance)will be posted to levels of educational institutes depending on their grades to impact knowledge.I dont know but this is just me.What will u do if u were the NSS director...??
ReplyDeleteInteresting ideas. However Teza, I think the NSS is a post-tertiary service to the "Nation", and not the government, or??? And it's mandatory for all Ghanaian graduates regardless of whether you schooled in Ghana, or got your tertiary education tuition fees subsidized or not, you've still gotta do it; it's more like a ritual...nd you don't have to be 'an economist, a social scientist, or the like' to know this, or??? ...ha ha! (just teasing...rofl)
ReplyDeleteGreat ideas. You should probably be the NSS director.
ReplyDeleteI also think that national service should strictly be focused on the government sector rather than private sector. After all, it's national service!
Well said Teresa. The issue however is a little but more complicated that presented here. Going through CVs of graduates would take ages considering the king of resources available to the service.
ReplyDeleteAlso I think there is a chichen-and-egg situation when we consider the projects presented in our universities. The authorities know for sure that they were unable to give us the best environment and equipment to work with thus it will find it hard to resort to our projects for answers to its problems. Trust me, more than half the projects we submit to our departments are not worth the grades awarded them. Most are cut-and-paste others are just edited versions of someone else's work in another school. I wouldnt count on it if I were the NSS Director
Yes, the NSS ought to be improved, but there's so much misinformation here, @Everyone; please visit: http://www.nssghana.org/about_nss.htm. Get informed first, then u can criticize the system.
ReplyDelete@Edward; u make such serious allegations against our universities "online"??? wow!?